Tiny Gems

It pays to get close to the ground. Some of the smallest plants are beauties. The pimpernels have such vivid colouring, but on this occasion, the close-up was more of a balls-up, and when I get a better shot, I shall replace this one. The shot of the red version was even worse...Edited to show a much better close-up of the blue.


The tiny Silene I found yesterday was all alone, and I couldn't find it again when I went out this morning to try to decide which species it was. For those of you who are not botanists, this is the same family as the Red Campion, common in the UK, but this is tiny, the flowers not much more than a centimetre in diameter and a pale, pale pink. I took this photo early in the morning, and the flowers, and the hairy grey leaves of the plant it is leaning over, are glistening with dew.

Edit I came across a Spanish website called Virtual Herbal, and I think I can now identify this as Silene Ramosissima. If you look it up on the Virtual Herbal and click on the link that says Imagen en el campo, it takes you to a photo that shows how hairy it really is.



Walking along the cliff top this morning, I took this photo of a large clump of helianthemum, a plant that at one time, grew all over The Bottom. When I got home, I went in search, and found this tiny specimen. I haven't bothered finding out which particular type it is, I'm just keeping my fingers crossed that I find more. Edited to say that there are more, in fact a couple of good sized clumps that I hadn't noticed until they flowered.The last one really is a weed; it grows rampantly all over the garden, turns up in pots, and even between the bricks in the walls; the ever present Herb Robert. Without anything to give it scale, it could be taken for a garden variety of Geranium.